Behind the Mask
by ChaosOfAButterfly
Summary: Prequel to The Team Again. Life was never kind to Arthur, but he did what he could. Oneshot.


Arthur could pinpoint the exact moment his life took the turn that would make it into what it now was. He was 8 ½ years old. His mother married Marshal Kayne.

This was not news in and of itself. His mother, a drug addict in her late twenties, was constantly getting married and divorced. There was a never ending stream of men in Arthur's life.

Of course, they weren't really _in_ Arthur's life. They mostly ignored him.

That all changed when his mom married Marshal.

When his mother, Loraine Phillips, soon to be Loraine Kayne, started seeing Marshal, the seemingly endless stream of men stopped. When his mom finally married Marshal, they dropped Remy- Marshal's 11 year old son- off at the Phillips residence (a two bedroom apartment) and drove to Las Vegas for the weekend. Arthur had been unsure of what to do, but Remy, who was used to being left alone, made sure they had dinner. And so began their friendship...their brotherhood.

Arthur never changed his name. At first it was because he figured Marshal wouldn't be around long enough for it to matter, and by the time he learned better, he didn't want any connection to the man.

Remy, he learned, didn't have any official name. Remy was a name he stole from an X-Men character. He wasn't sure what his birth certificate said. And he definitely wasn't going to leave his last name as Kayne. Or so he said.

Remy was unlike anyone Arthur had ever met. He was loud, opinionated, and not afraid to take a few hits for his beliefs.

* * *

Life in the Kayne household was relatively normal for the first 4 months. Marshal was polite, if not a little loud. Remy always seemed on edge, warning Arthur that it was bound to change, but Arthur didn't believe him. And anyway, it didn't matter. One of the reasons his mother couldn't find a man is because she dated scumbags, and whenever anyone tried to fuck with him she'd leave them.

They could slap her around all they wanted, but Arthur was untouchable.

So it came as a shock to him when, the first time he refused to do something Marshal said- go get him a beer, maybe?- and Marshal slapped him, instead of his mother coming to stand in front of him, it was a much shorter presence.

Remy.

That night was the first time anyone had ever really beaten Arthur. It certainly wasn't the last. It was also when he learned that there were very few people you could rely on to have your back, and they weren't going to always be related to you by blood. Because Remy protected him that night. Not his mother.

* * *

The school teachers were always so baffled when good, sweet, quiet little Arthur got into fights. He wasn't really sure why. They knew what household he lived in, they all had met Remy- a boy notorious for beating up anyone that talked shit about him- and yet they were always shocked.

So was Arthur's mother, but she never said anything. Arthur thinks it's because she feels guilty that he even needs to know how to fight. And she never says Remy's a bad influence, even though he can tell she's thinking it.

Which is good. Because Remy- Remy is his savior. Remy is the light at the end of the tunnel for Arthur. He taught Arthur how to defend himself. He taught him when to take the punch and when to hit back, when to mouth off and when to just duck your head.

Of course, it not perfect. Hell, it's not even close. Like when Arthur is 9 and accidently drops a beer when bringing it to Marshal and spends the next two days locked in the basement by himself without any form of light.

Or when Arthur is 11 and he and Remy get into a fight with a couple of 15 year olds and none of the teachers say anything about the week-old bruises or the black eye or the split lip or the whip marks on Remy's lower back, and Arthur realizes just how cruel people can be simply by ignoring you.

Or when Arthur is 12 and Marshal is angry and for the first time offers him the choice of what he'll beat him with- belt, stick, wrench, - and Arthur chooses the wrench because "fuck you, that's why". He was black and blue for a month and Remy was scrubbing blood off the wall behind their toilet for hours after the fifth time he threw up.

Or when Arthur is 14 and Remy and Marshal start fighting and Arthur tried to get between them and threatens to call the cops on Marshal and Arthur learns that while being hit hurts a lot, being made to watch while the people you care about are beat is worse, and Arthur learns never to make threats you can't follow through.

Or when he's 15 and Marshal accuses him of drinking his beer and Arthur accuses Marshal of being a dead-beat, good-for-nothing drunkard, and Arthur learns just how hard it is to pick shards of glass out of your skin by yourself because Remy is locked in the storage shed in the backyard.

Or when Arthur is 16 and Remy abandons him.

Because really, that's what he did.

Just a single note left on an empty bed, surrounded by an empty closet and empty drawers.

_I'm the son of a good for nothing deadbeat drunk and I'm gonna end up just like him and goddamnit Pointdexter I'm not bringing you down with me._

Marshal beats him- because somehow this is his fault- and Arthur screams at him in anger so Marshal beats him some more and honestly, he can't be bothered to care, because at least it distracts him from the gaping, Remy-sized hole in his chest.

* * *

When Arthur is 18 he enlists. It's not that he's not smart enough to get into college without it, it's just that he has the hole in his chest from Remy leaving and the hole never really left and Arthur kind of wants to die and if he's gonna die he might as well die serving his goddamn country.

It's terrible logic and he knows it, but he signs the papers anyway. He signs them Joe Sullivan, in case Remy is paying attention, because Joe Sullivan was always one of the names Remy thought about taking.

Two weeks after he enlists he gets a letter from a man _also_ named Joe Sullivan and all it says is _"Really Pointdexter?"_ and he's so realized that he doesn't even have the strength to be angry.

Eventually he received a different notice. One from a special branch of the military- specifically, and place called the Military Dreamshare Training Center, which was interested in training him in something called dreamshare. He immediately signed up.

He wasn't sure he would have made the same choice if he knew what was to come.

Once at the Military Dreamshare Training Center, or MDTC, he was assigned to a squad. His Captain and trainer? A man named Dmitri Mahone.

Dmitri excelled in bringing others pain. And in the dreamshare, where nothing was real? Everything was allowed. He did things that you couldn't even imagine.

Arthur's not sure he would have survived, if it hadn't been for Thomas Eames.

Thomas Eames- or just Eames, as he went by- was not actually an official trainer, but he was equally as untouchable, having already graduated. And having had to deal with Dmitri's particular brand of cruel himself, he bonded with Arthur, defending him when he could.

Like when another man in Arthur's squad, Rickson Connelly, made his obsession with Arthur known. And attempted to stake his claim, so to speak.

He never actually succeeded in real life, though he did several times in dreamshare.

When Eames found out, there was no stopping him. He destroyed Rickson- in dreamshare, so there could be no repercussions- castrating the man. However, as it turned out, Rickson was Dmitri's nephew, making him untouchable in real life.

Arthur went AWOL soon after, glad he'd never given his real name. He worked freelance, doing what he could manage, for several years.

He stayed in touch with Remy through letters, ;earning of his- mostly illegal- adventures in Europe with a man who simply went by the initial S. He wouldn't learn till several years later, when the mysterious S was dying, having sacrificed himself for Remy, that S stood for Simms.

A couple years later, he was approached by a couple only a few years older than him. They introduced themselves as Dom and Mallory Cobb, and said that they were friends of Eames, and that they had a job for him. A job that was, strictly speaking, not entirely legal.

A job in dreamshare.


End file.
